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Carry On, carry On
The chanting has begun
A hymn of fame and glory forever
And ride on, ride on
In union we are strong
A symphony for freedom and glory
Can you imagine them? The mighty warriors triumphantly marching on
the battlefield? Chanting and celebrating victory? Just use
Freedom Call’s music as a soundtrack and I’m sure it will work.
You can’t really take this thing seriously, and if you’re not into
this kind of thing, the lyrics will make you cringe. But you can’t
deny there is something irresistible about these victorious battle
chants.
Style-wise, Freedom Call can compared to fellow countrymen
Edguy, Blind Guardian, Gamma Ray & Helloween
and bands like Hammerfall. Bombastic metal, with lots of
catchy melodies and anthemic choruses. Freedom Call may not
be the heaviest or the most noticeable of the bunch, but I’m pretty
sure most power metal fans will enjoy this very much.
The guitar playing is excellent. In a lot of metal, playing as many
notes as possible seems to be the main goal, but not so with
Freedom Call. The solos are played with a lot of attention to
melody and tone. The keyboards are quite prominent for a metal band;
pretty simplistic but effective. And I do like the drums: except for
a couple of songs, there isn’t that machine gun-type of drumming,
which I don’t like, but a powerful, more classic sound.
The album starts off with “Mother Earth”, which surprisingly is not
an example of the epic metal Freedom Call usually plays.
Still, it’s one of the best songs on the album, with some excellent
singing, great guitar work and atmospheric keys. “The Rhythm Of
Life” (somewhat Scorpions-like) and “Starlight” are in the
same mould. Yes, Freedom Call know how to bring just enough
variation to their music to keep things interesting. The battle
chants include “Carry On”, “High Enough”, “Starchild” and “Kings &
Queens”. “Hero Nation” has some great vocals and reminds me a bit of
Arjen Lucassen’s Star One project. The best songs are the
infectious “Hunting High And Low” and the title track, which starts
of very slow and builds up to epic proportions.
A
very nice album, which proves Freedom Call deserve a place
next to their aforementioned, more famous compatriots. |
